Quality product data improves business efficiency, establishes trust among parties within the electrical supply chain, helps promote the product, and wins contractor bids. With the growing world of eCommerce and the rise in electronic communications, ElectricSmarts’ NetPak, and its access to IDEA’s IDW, are what players in the electrical industry need to sync not sink

Wearable technology – or simply, wearables – has moved past the prototype stage and firmly established itself as an evolving product category. Expert forecasts say wearables are destined to succeed and estimate the wearable device market will grow exponentially, reaching over USD 12.5 billion in value by 2018. As activity monitors and smart watches gain in popularity, wearable device manufacturers realize the potential of their products to cross over into other industries like healthcare, fashion, sports, and many others.

To combat growing credit card fraud in the US, credit card companies have rolled out EMV (Europay, MasterCard, Visa) credit and debit cards. These “smart” cards are secured with an embedded silicon microchip to create a unique, one-time code for each transaction, replacing the traditional, fraud-susceptible magnetic strip cards. As of October 1, any businesses who are unable to accept EMV cards, and banks who have yet to issue the new cards to their customers, are liable in the event of fraud. Since this deadline has recently passed, we’ll take a deeper look into EMV cards and the impact they will have on retail and on consumer information security.

When dealing with data, and all related terminology, you may feel like you’re trying to speak a foreign language. In the interest of keeping things clear and simple, we will introduce commonly used terms that will help you navigate the data shorthand and learn the lingo. This week, we bring you: EDI gateways and interconnects.

The scene is familiar: A new widget is introduced to the market. Before long, the widget is all anyone can talk about. Consumers want it; companies scramble to make their own version; existing products are re-marketed for better comparison to that widget. Ultimately, consumer preferences were propelled by an industry trend, dictating the behavior of all major industry players.